


Worn Weary, Worn Smooth

by Oparu



Category: Sanctuary (TV)
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-20
Updated: 2011-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-27 15:30:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/297333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oparu/pseuds/Oparu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Helen contemplates her lovers and what each of them has taught her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Worn Weary, Worn Smooth

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Elysandra](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elysandra/gifts).



> mentions of canon character death.

Irene was the first after John. She smelt of Parisienne perfume and the starch of petticoats and was as far from the muscled chest of her fiancé. Irene was soft, full of callous, carefree laughter and she demanded no promises. There was no eternity with Irene, just a night without the promise of more in the morning than a goodbye kiss before morning tea even arrived.

Helen still misses her on cool evenings. Sometimes, standing on the roof of her Sanctuary, she can dredge up the memory of the swish of silk and satin and the way a corset felt pressed against her own. Corsets were long abandoned by the time she took another lover. Hair and hemlines rose while Helen built her network, and though she had James and Nikola in the multifaceted way she's always kept them near, she let herself get carried away with the pretty little brunette who studied engineering as if she were a poet of bridges.

Ranna is a more recent memory, one that holds more lost promise than Helen really cares to admit. They were kindred spirits, protectors of their worlds and each painfully aware of how little that career left to spend on pleasure. Their time was brief but intense. Ranna stayed in bed until tea arrived and ate on the edge, careful to keep crumbs out of the bed.

Nikola has none of that restraint. She could hear his clucking tongue. Being careful is the last thing on his mind when he makes love and she's lost count of the sheets he's ruined with her less savoury wines. He never spills any he likes, that would be a waste, but a few aren't as worthy of his care.

Back home in the cool north, she's far from the tropics and the taste of papaya and Charlotte's skin. She needed that blissful distraction as much as she needed Irene after John. Helen suspects, watching the lights come on over the city below, that she'll be trying to get over John for years to come. He's more like a chronic illness now and the sweetness of her more recent companions chases the bitter taste he left in her mouth, like the sugar cubes that followed her medicine as a child.

Nikola can soothe her, but he's full of enough of his own trouble that he's little more than an analgesic she's run dangerously tolerant of. Ranna was more reflective, producing a response in her that was richer, a deeper kind of healing. She misses her, more than she can tell Will or easily hide in her work. Praxis was a deep loss to the world, but Ranna held such potential to be more. She couldn't risk seeing her as she lived through history a second time and letting Praxis fall again to Adam's madness cut deep.

Resolve is her madness. She allowed the world to fall apart again, let her mistakes stalk her like her string of dead lovers. She remembers too vividly closing Irene's eyes, watching James crumble to dust and standing in Ranna's bedchamger, knowing she'd never again fall naked into that bed. Each time she promises herself this is the end, that she has no more to give another being, she drags along for awhile until someone creeps into her life like a virus.

Her body continues, unchanging, but her heart twists and wears. It feels as old fashioned as her Victorian clothing. She has let it change with the times, toughening as the hems grew shorter and trousers became the acceptable instead of the barbaric. The muscle is strong, thinking of her heart in the metaphorical is almost too poetic. If she deigns to believe in such things, her soul is still ageing. It's not a straightforward path, nothing that neat occurs in nature, but she feels the weight of her years even with the flesh of a lover pressed against hers.

She sleeps little, but when she shares her bed with another, she takes the time to be with them. She owes her thanks for the heat of breath against her chest and the scent of sweat dried on the sheets. Love making leaves the brighter sweat. That which reminds her of the sea rather than the gym.

Helen sighs, leaving the window for the loneliness of cool sheets and perfect pillows. There's something to be said for chaos, in small proportions. Love making is one of the visceral pleasures and she so rarely lets the wildness into her life.

Helen's life must be one of order, or else she cannot hold herself together. It is necessary distance, yet, she misses Irene, James, Ranna, John- the kind memories of him most of all, especially Charlotte, who still lingers on her tongue like an afterthought: a frizzante to the affair.

Will comes to wish her goodnight and she again toys with the idea of allowing him into her bed. He has a good heart, and she's learned that can be the most important part of a lover. He's too close to risk on a moment of weakness, so she wishes him a pleasant sleep.

She needs the city tonight, and heads down to change and emerge from the cocoon of her sanctuary. It protects her as much as it protects her charges. She is as alien as they, simply blessed with superior camouflage. Helen pulls her scarf high and counts on the drizzle to hide her. She's not known by most, and forgotten by many more.

Charlotte saw her as a woman first, then as a scientist and everything else. She enjoyed that. Too often she meets people as the great Dr. Magnus, leaving little chance for humanity. She's far from human, but she has the moments where she misses that simplicity.

That might be why she's in the bar down by the university. Professors laugh with their students, all ordinary for the night. She can let her accent mean she's a visiting professor, a biologist or a biochemist. She had a lovely chat with an English professor not long ago about Victorian poetry. She couldn't tell her that she'd known Christina Rossetti personally, but listening to her speak of so fondly of the woman had been charming.

She slides into a booth, letting her cocktail melt just enough for the alcohol not to be so sharp. Cocktails have evolved with time, changing the like the bar food. She orders onions rings. They hardly go with her gin, but she loves the un-evolved crunch of the breading. Eating them before they can go cold, Helen wipes her hands on the cheap paper napkin and looks up.

"This looks surprisingly like hanging out," Charlotte says, slipping in beside her.

"I may have re-evaluated my opinion of the matter. Hanging out may have some advantages of which I was not previously aware."

Charlotte rests a hand on her knee, her fingers warm through Helen's rain-dampened tights. "Glad you see it that way."

"I like to think my mind remains open."

"I'd vouch for that."

"I wasn't aware I needed a witness."

"You never know."

Helen crumples her napkin and leaves it in the basket. "Buy you a drink?"

"As long as it's from the top shelf."

"Oh?"

"Someone's been trying to teach me the finer things in life. Would be a shame to spoil it now, wouldn't it?" Charlotte steals the garnish from Helen's drink, toying with the mint leaves. The sharp scent clings to her lips and she leans across the table. "You did say if I was even in the neighbourhood."

"I'm rather pleased you took me so literally."

"It's the scientist in me."

Helen waves down the bartender and orders something James had her try once in the backstreets of London. The bartender smirks, but seems hopeful.

Hope is the emotion of the times. Helen's lived through exploration and conquests, war and reconstruction. There's nothing else to cling too now, but hope. Hope for a better day; possibly a better world. Charlotte has that raw hope of her generation. The headlong desire to make something new.

"How was your presentation?"

"Excellent, thank you, but that's enough of work."

"Oh?"

"Let's talk about poetry, or the weather."

"The latter is wretched."

"Good weather for a fire." Charlotte nods her thanks as her drink appears. "You must have a fireplace."

"Several." Helen finishes her own and reaches for the second. "I hope that's not too predictable."

"Here I was, thinking it was foolish to assume."

"Some things are worth assuming."

Charlotte smirks over her straw. "Apparently anything involving you and the finer things in life is safe."

"These are the best onion rings on this side of the city."

"I'm sure."

"I've conducted a thorough search."

"I'm sure it was a well-performed study, perfectly researched."

Helen beams. "Would you have done anything different?"

Charlotte eats her own garnish this time, toying with the mint. "I can think of one thing I would have changed."

"Do tell."

Reaching across the table, Charlotte holds her hand. "I would have brought company."


End file.
